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Gros blanc 'à la queue' - John II
| Issuer | Kingdom of France |
|---|---|
| Year | 1355 |
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| Composition | Billon (.269 silver) |
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| Obverse description | The obverse displays a plain cross pattée at center, set within a beaded inner circle. The quadrants formed by the cross arms each contain a lis or decorative element in the characteristic Tournois style. A double legend surrounds the inner circle: the inner legend reads the royal titulature of King John II and the outer legend carries a religious invocation, both rendered in Gothic uncial characters. The coin exhibits the irregular flan shape typical of hammered medieval French billon coinage. |
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| Obverse lettering | ♕ IOHANNES REX ☩ BNDITV ⋮ SIT ⋮ NOME ⋮ DHI ⋮ NRI ⋮ DEI ⋮ H ☽ V ⋮ XPI (Translation: King John Blessed be the name of our Lord) |
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| Additional information |
John II struck this issue during one of the most financially ruinous periods of the Capetian succession — the Hundred Years' War was bleeding the treasury, and the French crown had resorted to systematic debasement to meet military costs. The "à la queue" designation distinguishes it from earlier gros blanc types by the tail-like extension on a specific element of the design, a detail that mattered to contemporaries primarily as a way to track successive debasement cycles.
John was captured at Poitiers the following year, 1356, and the ransom demand of three million gold écus made the monetary instability of this period considerably worse.